Soundarya Lahari--Verse 61

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Asau nAsA-vamsas tuhina-girivamsa-dhvajapati

tvadIyo nedIyah phalatu phalam asmAkam ucitam;

vahaty anatar muktAh sisira-kara-nisvAsa galitam

samrddhyA yat tAsAm bahir api ca muktA-mani-dharah

 

O Flag of the staff [dynasty] of the snow-capped Mountain! may this,

the bamboo of Thy nose, immediately bear us the cherished fruit.

Bearing in its [hallow] interior pearls, kept in their places by Thy

very cool breath, it wears a pearl outside also, there being an

abundance of them [pearls therein].

 

Flag - Here is a clever metaphorical reference made by the poet to

the Devi, the daughter of Himavat, she being represented by

implication as the flag conspicuously floating at the top of the

dynasty of Himavat which is represented to be the bamboo staff on

which the flag floats

 

Staff- note the pun on the original word 'Vamsa', which

means 'bamboo', as well as 'dynasty'. Here the Devi's nose is

compared to the bamboo, which encloses a hollow within and which,

according to the tradition obtaining among Samskrt writers, is

described as producing pearls. The Cherished fruit- ostensibly the

pearls of the bamboo, but really the Kaivalya sought from the Devi.

The fact that the Devi's nose wears as an ornament a pearl outside,

is taken advantage of by the poet, who represents it as one of the

pearls in the hollow of the bamboo-like nose, cast by the exhaling

breath of the Devi and forming an index, as it were, to the pearls

inside. Laksmidhara adopts the following reading : 'Vahaty antar

muktAh sisirakara-nisvAsa-galitam samrddhyA yat tAsAm bahir api ca

muktA-mani-dharah', and takes 'Sisirakara', which means the 'Moon',

as indicating the breath passing through the left {IdA] NAdI,

wherein, according to YogasAstra, the Moon functions.

 

Then he construes the compound word " MuktA-mani-dharah' as 'MuktA-

manim dhrtavAn', and no satisfied with this, suggests as a better

reading. 'MuktA-manim adhat'. In that case the latter half would

mean : 'It bears pearls in its [hollow] interior and hence wears a

pearl outside also, cast as it were by the lunar [left nostril]

breath, there being an abundance of them [pearls therein]. Herein is

reference to the South Indian custom of boring a hole through the

left side of the nose of women, so as to attach an ornament with a

pearl pendant.

 

 

Yantra image in : SS homepage.

 

http://www.shaktisadhana.org/Newhomepage/sadhana/Commentaries.html

 

The Saundarya-Lahari of Sri Samkara-Bhagavatpada.

By Pandit S. Subrahmanya Sastri and T.R Srinivasa Ayyangar.